1. Technical Field
The present invention relates generally to an improved data processing system and in particular to a method and apparatus for handling events. Still more particularly, the present invention relates to a method, apparatus, and computer instructions for translating events into a format for correlation.
2. Description of Related Art
Currently, many customer network data processing systems employ correlation and automation solutions to aide in analyzing complex business environments implemented in their network data processing systems. These correlation and automation solutions are employed to consolidate and correlate event data or cross network systems to quickly and accurately identify the true root cause of a problem. Once the root cause is determined, processes or actions may be taken to adjust, fix, reconfigure, or provision resources to solve the problem. These correlation and automation solutions are also referred to as customer system management solutions. Typically, a vendor specific product is provided to perform actions for given products. These vendor specific products use proprietary systems for detecting, generating and handling event data. When a customer looks for a newer customer system management product, these vendor specific products typically require a replacement or a replacement strategy to change vendors. In many cases, a customer will choose to stay with the same vendor in order to avoid the costly replacement of software. This can be true even in merger and acquisitions type situations, resulting in different parts of the company using different system management software so that it becomes very difficult for information technology (IT) department of the company to manage. To compound the situation, many customers are using vendor specific formats for event management to notify them when an alert must be raised instead of utilizing open standards for performance reasons. As a result, vendors may be entrenched with the customer because the cost to change applications makes this change prohibitive. As a result, many customers do not change or move to a different event management system even though such a system may provide better performance.
Therefore, it would be advantageous to have an improved method, apparatus, and computer instructions for allowing an event management system to work with a vendor specific format used to generate event data.